Editor's Note:
In Dr. Elyad's article in the October 8, 1993 issue of "DC," "Chiropractic Management Consultants Should Conform to a Certification Process," she wrote an open letter to Dr. Howard Ross, president of the H.J. Ross Co., Inc. and member of the Society of Chiropractic Management Consultants (SCMC). Her current article is a second letter to Dr. Ross, discussing the SCMC. The Society last met in March of 1993, and will have its next meeting in March of 1994. For more information on the SCMC, contact Society President Dr. Charles Gibson of Gibson Management Consultants at (714) 347-0377, or Past SCMC President Dr. Richard Vincent at (617) 229-5672.
The following is a letter that I wrote to Howard Ross, of H.J. Ross Company, Inc.
Dear Mr. Howard Ross:
It was good talking to you by phone the other day. Thank you for your intention to bring up the points that we discussed with the Society for Chiropractic Management Consultants.
The attitude and the agenda of the Society for Chiropractic Management Consultants about the law and ethical matters is most important. I understand that this organization is only two years old and still in the formative stage. You said you can't see how the organization could develop the resources now to do a legal certification process for the management consultant members, as I suggested.
We agree that some formal process concerning the law and ethical matters, beyond what the current Ethics Committee can do, is advised. The entire body of the organization needs to be involved. When everybody's involved, it sends the message, "We value following the law. We value ethical conduct in our businesses." It is out of this process of valuing the law and ethical matters, and working to make these values real, that the Society of Practice Management Consultants can develop resources and accomplish goals concerning legal matters and ethics.
For the practice managers, creating more credibility about their legal and ethical business conduct should make it worthwhile for them to invest their time and effort in this direction. The chiropractic profession wants to know that what DCs are being taught by practice managers conforms to the letter and spirit of the law.
You support this, and said you will talk about creating a strong ethical environment at the next meeting of the Society of Chiropractic Management Consultants. They meet for a weekend on an annual basis, and you were uncertain about the date of the next meeting. You said they are likely to respond positively because they are concerned about how to reposition themselves in the current market.
Over the long run, when the Society of Chiropractic Management Consultants agrees to standards, it should be productive. They want to show they are a quality organization.
You suggested that the Society of Chiropractic Management Consultants might be able to set up a legal and ethical review mechanism. It could review the management firms to some degree, and it could be a clearing house for complaints. The Society members would promise to abide by decisions of the review process.
I think that if this process comes about, the general membership of the Society should also agree to approve a prompt referral to legal authorities concerning any possible illegality that comes to light. Another suggestion, that we didn't speak about is that the Society could be responsible for airing areas of complaint by creating profession-wide discussion of problem areas in the law and ethics that are brought up in the review processes.
As I said to you, what is legal chiropractic practice and our ethical questions have started to seem like a vast area to me. We spoke about all the different legal codes that effect what we practicing DCs do behind the closed doors of our practices. Personally, I'm most interested in focusing on legal matters within the profession concerning overutilization and fraud. I always remember overutilization/fraud is a euphemism for lying, cheating, and stealing ...
Thank you very much for your attention to these matters. I look forward to further communication with you.
Yours in chiropractic,
Linda S. Elyad, DC
To aid in a profession-wide discussion of problem areas in law and ethics, Dynamic Chiropractic and I now invite the readers to write to the editor. Tell us, have you been advised by practice managers to do things that you don't feel comfortable with? What have you been told to do? When and where did this occur? Who told you to do it? What was their attitude? Have you ever been advised by your practice manager to overutilize or commit fraud?
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